Sir Bradley Wiggins has dropped a hint that next month’s Ghent Six may not, in fact, be his final race, saying he wouldn’t rule out riding the boards of London’s Lea Valley VeloPark again.
The 36-year-old was speaking after he and Mark Cavendish were edged out at the London Six Day last night by defending champions, Kenny de Ketele and Moreno de Pauw.
Wiggins and Cavendish, who in March won the Madison world championship at the Lea Valley VeloPark, had led going into the final race but were edged out by the Belgian pair at the last.
Next month, Wiggins heads to Ghent, the city of his birth, to partner Cavendish again in what he had said would be the final event of a career that has brought him five Olympic and eight world titles on the road and track, as well as the overall victory at the 2012 Tour de France.
Asked if he might be back at Six Day London in 2017, the Guardian reports Wiggins as saying: “I’ve enjoyed it that much, I just don’t know at the moment. I’d love to still be part of it in the future. I still love riding my bike, I love racing.
“Who wouldn’t want to come back, with a week like this and the crowds like this? It’s been incredible.”
The past week has seen Wiggins return to racing for the first time since it the Fancy Bears hacking group released details of Therapeutic Use Exemptions granted to him ahead of the Tour de France in 2011 and 2012, as well as the 2013 Giro d’Italia.
He has also been embroiled in controversy over the contents of a package delivered to Team Sky at the Criterium du Dauphine in 2011 containing an unspecified medicine said to be intended for him.
Both episodes are subject to an investigation that has been launched by UK Anti-Doping.
Regardless of those issues, the crowd gave Wiggins a rapturous reception throughout the week at the track where Wiggins set the UCI Hour Record in June last year before he and Cavendish regained the rainbow jerseys they had last won in the Madison in 2008.
Here’s footage of some of the best of the action as well as reaction from Cavendish and Wiggins.
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He also said "money talks, dunnit?" getting a laugh from the audience. If the organisers offered him a chunk of money to turn up - even if not with Cav trying to win, maybe with one of the Wiggins team juniors - it would help ticket sales and he'd be daft not to take the coin.